Fiction for Younger Kids

Big Book for Peace
Dutton, 1990
E Big
A collection of essays, stories and poems on the positive ness of peace the and the negativity of war by children's authors such as Katherine Paterson, Jean Fritz, Jean George, Lois Lowry, and Steven Kellogg, and with illustrations by Maurice Sendak, Paul Zelinsky and the Dillons.

Heide, Florence Parry
Sami and the Time of the Troubles
Clarion, 1992
E Hei
A ten-year-old Lebanese boy goes to school, helps his mother with chores, plays with his friends, and lives with his family in the basement when bombing occurs and fighting begins on the streets

Leaf, Munro
The Story of Ferdinand
Viking , 1936
E Lea
Ferdinand is a bull who would rather sit quietly under a tree and smell the flowers, rather than join the other bulls in the bull fighting pen.

Pilkey, Dav
World War Won
Landmark Editions, 1987
E Pil
Two kings , a fox and a raccoon become embroiled in a competition to build the highest stockpile of weapons, until a strong wind threatens to topple the stockpile, making them all frightened of what the consequences may be.

Seuss, Dr.
The Butter Battle Book
Random House, 1984
E Seu
Engaged in a long standing battle, the Yooks and the Gooks, invent more and more sophisticated weaponry as they attempt to outdo each other.

Older Fiction

Collier, James
My Brother Sam is Dead
Scholastic, 1974
YA PB Col
The tragic story of a revolutionary war family, whose one son joins the Rebel army while the rest of the family tries to stay neutral in a Tory town.

Giff, Patricia Reilly
Lily's Crossing
Delacort, 1997
+ Gif
During a summer spent at Rockaway Beach during World War II, Lilly meets a young Hungarian refugee, and begins to look at the war and her world through different eyes.

Giff, Patricia Reilly
The War Began at Supper
Delacort Press, 1991
+ PB Gif 
The students in a fifth grade class write to their former student teacher about events at school, as well as comments about the current Persian Gulf War.

Kerr, Jean
Slap Your Sides
Harper Collins, 2001
YA Kerr
The setting, World War II in Pennsylvania. Young Jubal struggles with his beliefs and the role he and his family have in town, as his older brother professes his Quaker beliefs, and becomes a conscientious objector.

Kurtz, Jane
The Storyteller's Beads
Scholastic, 1998
+ PB Kur
The setting is in Ethiopia during the strife and famine of the 1980's. Two girls, one Christian and the other Jewish and blind, struggle to overcome many difficulties, including their prejudices against each other, as they make their way out of the dangerous country.

Mead, Alice
Soldier Mom
Farrar and Straus, 1999
+ Mea
Eleven year old Jasmyn gets a different perspective on life when her mother is sent to Saudi Arabia at the beginning of the Persian Gulf War, leaving her and her baby half brother behind in Maine in the care of her mother's boyfriend.

Yep, Laurence
Lady of Ch'iao Kuo (Royal Diaries)
Scholastic, 2001
+ Yep
In 5th century China, a princess in southern China keeps a diary as she takes on the daunting role of the liaison between her own people and the local colonists during times of both war and peace.

Past Featured Books